TwitNine

Many Twitter neophytes want to know what the rules are or whether Twitter has standard protocol and etiquette. Like many other social media sites, Twitter sprang from a close-knit group of early adopters who set the rhythm. Because Twitter was a favorite of Silicon Valley’s new-media elite long before it broke into the mainstream, some insider jokes and conventions used can be confusing. Longtime users have certainly fallen into certain habits or sets of rules. But now that Twitter has become so popular and diverse, you canfind plenty of wiggle room to do your own thing.

Like any other social-media company, Twitter has a Terms of Service (TOS) agreement that all members must adhere to or risk having their accounts suspended or deleted. You can access Twitter’s terms at http://twitter.com/terms. You won’t find anything particularly surprising in them: You must be at least 13 years old to create an account and use the service, you can’t engage in abuse or harassment, you can’t spam other members or participate in activities that break any laws, and so on. The terms are actually more liberal than most Web services’ regulations; pornography and explicit language, for example, aren’t banned.

Beyond the terms of service, Twitter etiquette is simple: Be genuine and non deceptive and provide value. Other than that, just use Twitter how it suits you. This is primarily an unofficial protocol, but do keep in mind that Twitter keeps tabs on “deceptive” activity, too: Twitter can ban accounts that impersonate celebrities or companies if those accounts don’t make it clear that they’re unofficial or parodies. This policy is a contentious point in the Twitter community: Many members were upset when the @cwalken account, belonging to an aspiring comedian pretending to be actor Christopher Walken, was deleted from the system.

Beyond the simple regulations, you can’t really use Twitter in a right or wrong way because no two people use it for exactly the same reasons. But some members certainly have their opinions:

• Some users complain when others tweet too often, whereas others complain that their contacts don’t tweet enough. (This complaint is a little silly. Don’t like the contents? Turn the dial. Unsubscribe.)
• Some users take issue with strings of @replies and wonder why those conversations weren’t conducted in a private forum.
• You may encounter confusing, even conflicting, advice and back-seat tweeting from the handful of people on Twitter who aren’t comfortable without rules. Don’t take them too seriously; Twitter just isn’t that rigid.

Many people are hearing about Twitter for the first time because they’ve seen it on entertainment news shows such as Access Hollywood or The Soup. Celebrities use Twitter, too! The celebrities who use Twitter do so for different
reasons:

To connect with fans:
Bands such as Coldplay (@coldplay) announce tour and concert dates by using Twitter. Cyclist Lance Armstrong(@lancearmstrong) provides information about the race circuit and his charity efforts.

To get personal:
Basketball star Shaquille O’Neal (@THE_REAL_SHAQ) and celebrity couple Ashton Kutcher (@aplusk) and Demi Moore (@mrskutcher) use Twitter to offer an intimate and often irreverent glimpse into their lives.

To share interests
Rapper MC Hammer (@MCHammer), who founded a Web video startup called DanceJam.com, uses his Twitter stream to help promote new artists, share his favorite music, and offer lively thoughts on the state of the industry.

To be real
Singers Miley Cyrus (@mileycyrus) and Sara Bareilles (@SaraBareilles) tweet just like the rest of us gushing in excitement over successes, complaining over tired feet and other mundane life moments that make theirs seem a whole lot more “real.”

In many ways, Twitter functions as a sort of impromptu fan club for techsavvy celebs both renowned and up-and-coming. In the weeks leading up to publication, Oprah Winfrey (@Oprah) and other world renowned household brands have started to sign up. Rumor has it that 1.5 million new people reached Twitter.com in the weekend after Ashton Kutcher appeared on her show and Oprah started to tweet.

Here are a few more Twitter accounts you may want to take a peek at:

✓ Jimmy Fallon (http://twitter.com/jimmyfallon)
✓ Tina Fey (http://twitter.com/TinaFey)
✓ Rainn Wilson (http://twitter.com/rainnwilson)
✓ 50 Cent (http://twitter.com/50cent)
✓ John Mayer (http://twitter.com/johncmayer)
✓ Jimmy Eat World (http://twitter.com/jimmyeatworld)
✓ Wil Wheaton (http://twitter.com/wilw)
✓ Soleil Moon Frye (http://twitter.com/moonfrye)
✓ John Cleese (http://twitter.com/JohnCleese)

People do start Twitter accounts using celebrities’ names, and they often get a whole slew of followers who have no idea that they’re not following the “real” celebrity the person they think they’re following. Impersonating someone on Twitter violates Twitter’s Terms of Service, and Twitter has shut down accounts by impersonators. You can usually tell whether the person is legit by looking at the number of followers if he has a large number of followers, the chances are good that he’s for real, but even that isn’t a guarantee. Of course,you may not care if the person is the real celebrity if you actually enjoy the person’s tweets!

Many companies have found value in Twitter as a way to build awareness of their brand name, strengthen relationships with customers, provide better and more immediate customer service, and boost sales. Companies’ presences on Twitter range from individual Twitter accounts belonging to CEOs and employees, to corporate accounts for the brand run by teams of marketing or PR representatives.

Here are some of the most famous examples of companies that have gotten
some positive buzz for their presence on Twitter:

Zappos.com

This online retailer was founded in the dot-com boom and is based in Las Vegas. It has fully integrated Twitter into its corporate structure. Not only does the company monitor and use Twitter for customer service and feedback, but CEO Tony Hsieh encourages Zappos.com employees to participate on Twitter to keep the world posted on what’s going on in the company. (He even has an account for his cat, El Gato, who is @el_gato.)

Of nearly 1600 Zappos.com employees, more than 400 are on Twitter,
(http://twitter.zappos.com/employees) actively tweeting to one another, about their own lives and work, and, in the process, Zappos.com. Hsieh himself often responds to Twitter users if they tweet him about a problem or specific need. Hsieh and the rest of Zappos.com make sure that they’re engaged with their customer base, both current and potential. Their dedicated microsite http://Twitter.Zappos.com features Twitter searches for every brand they sell, collected tweets about Zappos, and an amalgamation of every employee’s tweets and profiles.

Comcast:

After serious issues with negative connotations to their brand name, this cable company took Twitter by surprise (although they had been actively listening to Twitter for two months when they did) and established the Comcast Cares account (@comcastcares), run by Frank Eliason, the company’s director of “digital care.” Frank now has a team of employees on Twitter who handle customer service, helping as many as they can and backed up by the ability to escalate problems directly into Comcast’s executive customer service department. How this will scale remains to be seen, but Frank’s team is extremely dedicated and inspiring and has attracted substantial press coverage and goodwill toward the company.

Dell:

This computer manufacturer has also had some branding issues. At one point, customers filled a popular anti-Dell Web site with negative feedback and derogatory remarks. The company countered with a strong social media program that now includes real people behind active Twitter accounts, such as @RichardAtDell, offering customer service support and Twitter-only discount deals (DellOutlet) that led to over a million in sales. Dell, which also maintains a Twitter-focused microsite at www.dell.com/twitter, is engaging with customers in several innovative ways thanks to Twitter’s ability to enable real-time interactions and on-the-ball responses.

After it gained a foothold among the digital-media enthusiasts at the South by Southwest Interactive Festival in 2007, Twitter quickly became a playground for techies and geeks. But over time, people from all walks of life have discovered Twitter and embraced it. Twitter allows a user to communicate effectively with one person or many, and the benefits can work for anyone.

Twitter has become a quick and easy way to stay connected to family,
friends, and coworkers. People at all levels of all sorts of business can use
Twitter to easily interact with customers and potential clients and get real time engagement and feedback.

You’ll probably want to use Twitter to talk to people whom you know in real
life, such as your family and friends, as well as to meet some like-minded
people. But you can also meet some very unconventional people on Twitter.
Sometimes, the unconventional twitterers are the most interesting. On Twitter, you’ll encounter everyone from celebrities to local religious leaders and great-grandmothers who blog. You never know who you may find from day to day, which is part of Twitter’s charm.

But the biggest asset of Twitter is the sheer mass of everyday people who
want to share their thoughts, spread the news, and network. You can probably discover at least one new thing from someone on Twitter every day that you log in.

Plus, as superficial as a stream of 140-character messages may seem, the Twitter community has evolved into a real way for real people to connect in the real world, too. You can easily set up meetings and events through Twitter on fairly short notice, so many twitterers find themselves turning their online connections into offline friendships and business relationships
fairly often. Both introverted and extroverted people can really benefit from
this environment.

So, what non celebrity people can you find on Twitter? At first glance, you
may think that everyone on Twitter is in the technology or marketing industries in some way. The core-base of twitterers who formed Twitter’s initial user group still tweet away, and they’re still some of the most prolific users. But you can also find thousands of people tweeting who are just like you, your mom, or your best friend from high school in fact, your mom and
your best friend from high school may already be on Twitter.

Twitter is a very receptive environment for forging connections with new friends and contacts, so amassing a list of followers is relatively simple. Typically, you gain followers in the natural course of using Twitter, but here are a few guidelines to follow:

Be real:Being genuine goes a long way, and you’re likely to gain followers without even trying.

Be interesting: You don’t have to fascinate with every tweet you type,but do try to tweet about things more relevant to the world at large than what you just ate for lunch or the heinous traffic on your morning commute.Talk about your interests, instead. Talk about what’s in the news.Or talk about what you think should be in the news.

Be involved:The more “into” a topic you are, the more people will
respond to your enthusiasm. Say that you’re really into classic cars don’t talk just about your own fascination with them, but try to help other people on Twitter who might have questions on the subject. Get into heated conversations and debates, too. Without being too authoritative, position yourself as someone who has some valuable information
on your chosen issue to see an increase in your number of followers.

TIP:Plenty of influential people use Twitter, from celebrities like Ashton Kutcher(@aplusk) and Britney Spears (@britneyspears) to politicians like Democratic Congresswoman Claire McCaskill (@clairecmc) and dozens more. Heck, now that Oprah Winfrey (@Oprah) tweets, it’s almost proofenough in and of itself just to mention her.

If you’re lucky enough that @Oprah posts a tweet with your @username in it usually after you @Oprah her, and she notices and responds you’re going to be barraged by new followers who’ve seen your username in connection with that famous person’s. But the most popular Twitter users have hundreds of thousands of followers and hundreds of people @replying to them, so don’t count on a response from a famous twitterer as a way to get your foot in the door when it comes to Twitter influence.

Some Twitter users try to lure followers by offering contests, giveaways, or other incentives to reach certain pseudo-milestones, such as number of tweets or number of followers. This approach is a little bit cheesy and can look like you’re desperate for new followers. In our opinion, you can have a better time on Twitter if you just allow your network to grow organically.

Regardless of how you get people to follow you, make sure to keep your Twitter interactions genuine. What you post on Twitter and contribute to the conversation, along with your ability to listen, determines your authority more than any follower count ever could.

We can’t stress the importance of listening enough. The more you listen and hear what people have to say, and then respond thoughtfully, the more you can find out about people and the more well-rounded your experience (and the experience of your followers) becomes. Listening is the golden ticket of Twitter make sure to do it every day that you log in. And log in often.

All the action on Twitter, appropriately, lives front and center on your screen. This stream of Twitter updates doesn’t have an official Twitter sanctioned name. It contains your tweets and the tweets of those you follow in a chronological order, with the most recent tweets at the top.

This update stream goes by several names including stream, time line, or sometimes feed. Some people who follow thousands of Twitter users call it a river the tweet stream flows faster the more people you add to your list of friends and the more people you follow.

The stream only “flows” when you refresh your Web browser it doesn’t automatically display new tweets. Words like stream and flow most likely derive from the more dynamic moving displays on many third-party Twitter clients.

This is where the conversations happen; it’s your home base for connecting with people and businesses on Twitter. By reading your stream, you can find new people to listen to (friends of your friends and connections) and a place to jump in and participate.

Each tweet appears in its own little rectangular box. If you hover your cursor over the box, a Star and an Arrow icon (or, if it’s your tweet, a Star and a Trash Can icon) pop up on the right side of the tweet. These icons act like function buttons:

Star

Clicking the star button adds that tweet to your Favorites list
(which you can get to by clicking Favorites on the sidebar). When you
mark something as a favorite, you make it easier for yourself to find that
tweet in the future.

Arrow

Clicking the arrow sets up the tweet entry field so that you can reply to that user with an @reply.

Trash Can

This icon appears next to only your own tweets. Not surprisingly, clicking it lets you delete the tweet from the feed. (Note: If you’re not seeing a Trash Can icon next to your own tweet, odds are Twitter is working on something. Occasionally, the Trash Can icon disappears, and you have to wait to delete a tweet — all the more reason to make sure that you don’t tweet anything you don’t mean to tweet!)

Coming attractions: Retweet?

Ryan Kuder (@ryankuder), a popular Silicon Valley entrepreneur on Twitter best known for live-tweeting his layoff from Yahoo! in 2008, recently noticed and captured screenshots of a possible fourth interaction icon in development at Twitter: RT (www. ryankuder.com/2009/05/is-twitter-making-it-easier-toretweet). You can use the RT icon to repeat the tweet you’re reading in Twitter lexicon, to retweet. It makes a lot of sense that Twitter would be experimenting with such a feature, as most Twitter clients offer it, and Twitter has historically adapted its product to popular user behaviors.